Milestones: Cheers to all the years!

Many of the worst periods in economic history have proven fruitful for entrepreneurship. As Plato, the ancient Greek philosopher, observed, “Necessity is the mother of invention.”

Virginia, like the rest of the country, has experienced a surge in entrepreneurship since the pandemic. In the past four years, the number of applications for business formations in Virginia has averaged about 10,700 each month, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

But those entrepreneurial dreams are often dashed quickly. Less than 57% of Virginia startups celebrate a five-year anniversary, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data analyzed by LendingTree. Being around to celebrate anniversaries decades — or even centuries — later is rare.

Perhaps Plato was onto something. It could be coincidental, but six of seven prominent Virginia-based companies celebrating milestone anniversaries in 2024 opened their doors during years when the U.S. was in an economic recession. Beyond their recession-era beginnings, being family owned is another commonality among these venerable businesses, as are long-tenured leaders and a focus on a strong company culture.

Here, then, are the stories behind seven Virginia companies celebrating milestone anniversaries this year, from 25 to 150 years.

150 YEARS

Bliley’s Funeral Home
Richmond

At least one thing has remained constant in Richmond since the late 1800s: When people die, their loved ones need help celebrating and mourning them. For the past 150 years, the Bliley family funeral business has been a stalwart for area funeral and cremation services.

It’s a heritage Carey Bliley feels humbled and honored to continue as the fourth generation leading the family business. He joined in 1999 and became president and CEO in 2006, following in the footsteps of his father, Norbert. Growing up, Bliley knew he wanted to work for the family business, having witnessed firsthand the sense of vocation his father and uncles had helping people during their toughest times in life. 

“I really learned a lot about how to care for people,” Bliley says. “This work is bigger than us; it’s a way to really serve and give back. It’s never a job.”

If he’d had the opportunity to glimpse the future, Joseph W. Bliley might not have recognized the funeral services business he launched in 1874 as a continuation of the family’s horse-and-buggy livery. But its values are familiar. Like his predecessors, Carey Bliley takes seriously the responsibility to uphold the trust the business has built up over time and to serve the community, families and staff.

Among the secrets to the company’s longevity is that even as it celebrated its 150-year anniversary, leaders were still looking for opportunities to improve. “Our No. 1 value is doing the right thing, always, even when it comes at our expense,” Bliley says.

The first Bliley’s funeral home was downtown, where the Greater Richmond Convention Center is now located. In the many decades since, the company has expanded into three locations in Richmond and the surrounding counties of Henrico and Chesterfield. It’s also modernized its facilities and services, like adding livestreaming capabilities. Notable milestones include providing the first ambulance services in Richmond in 1917, launching a long-running cooperative program in 1985 to provide burial services for unborn children at no cost to families, and opening Bliley’s Cremation Center in 2012 to allow families and friends to be present during the cremation process.

“In our line of work, you have to have total flexibility,” Bliley says. “Every family is unique, and you have to be able to meet them where their needs are.”

For a family business, there aren’t too many Bliley names on the roster of about 120 staff, but the company embraces a family mindset. “We’re all Blileys here,” Bliley says.

That said, Bliley hopes the business will remain in the family for subsequent generations. Both he and his cousin, Eric, have three children who may one day decide to follow their well-trodden path into the family business. 

If they do, they’ll find that each leader encounters new ways to reshape and adapt. During his 25 years, Bliley has watched the cremation rate skyrocket to more than 60% nationwide. Helping families find tangible ways to deal with loss when services look different, or families are more spread out are some of the challenges he’s faced. 

At the same time, incorporating universal rituals, whether religious or secular, are important today — especially in an era when some people don’t want to deal with negative events. “The more you run from death, the harder it is to move forward,” Bliley says. “Rituals are really important to provide healing.”

100 YEARS

Virginia Chamber of Commerce
Richmond

When the Virginia Chamber of Commerce celebrated its centennial earlier this year, the event drew politicians from both parties, leaders across various industries and other notable Virginians. Even while celebrating the chamber’s past accomplishments, the future was also top of mind.

Ensuring that Virginia remains one of the nation’s top states for business is a tangible goal for years to come, according to Barry DuVal, president and CEO of the business advocacy organization. Vigilance will also define the chamber’s next 100 years.

“Today, not everybody views business as a force for good,” DuVal says. The chamber must remind elected officials of the important role businesses play in advancing economic growth by creating jobs that lift people out of poverty, while also encouraging businesses to be good corporate citizens, he adds.

Long after his tenure is over, DuVal hopes the chamber will continue to endorse ideas and not political candidates. This was a change he instituted after he took the helm in 2010.

“We’re a purple state, and the business community at the chamber represents people in all political parties, so it’s important to stay focused on issues that are relevant to the business climate of the state,” DuVal says.

The Virginia Chamber of Commerce was founded in 1924 by leaders of several established local chambers with the goal of acting as a unified voice for business in all of Virginia. The founding came about at a time when the state’s economy was transitioning from a largely agrarian economy to becoming increasingly industrialized.

As Virginia’s economy has evolved, the chamber’s advocacy efforts have as well, spanning a wide range of public policy issues: education, racial integration, urbanization, transportation, regional competitiveness and economic development. Combined, DuVal and his predecessor, Hugh Keogh, have overseen the Virginia Chamber of Commerce for about a third of its history. 

Under DuVal’s leadership, membership has swelled, from about 1,000 in 2010 to about 31,500 today. “We’re focused on making Virginia the best state for business.”

75 YEARS

M.C. Dean
Tysons

As a kid, Bill Dean recalls how impressed he was by the employees who worked at the once-small electrical company his grandfather, World War II Navy veteran Marion Caleb “M.C.” Dean, founded. “They were really cool and smart,” Dean says. “A lot of people stayed there for many, many years.”

When Dean took the reins of the Tysons-based company in 1997 from his father, Casey, in 1997 at age 32, he had an eye on growth. M.C. Dean formally established a technology business, building off Dean’s prior experience in wireless technology, and racked up some major government contract wins — the first of which was upgrading the IT infrastructure of the Library of Congress, which led to ongoing maintenance contracts.

Subsequent years saw the company named as engineer of record for the Pentagon, which has resulted in various contracts, each in excess of $250 million, for projects that include updating electronic and physical security systems. M.C. Dean also diversified into major institutional infrastructure systems on its way to surpassing $1 billion in annual revenue a few years ago.

That growth would have been difficult to achieve were it not for the groundwork laid by Dean’s father and grandfather — work that will likewise set the company up for success in its next 75 years as, Dean says, trends like the modularization of complex infrastructures and innovation of new information technologies are likely to “seismically alter” the electrical engineering industry.

The company now employs more than 5,800 and Dean has continued the tradition of hiring people who are problem-solvers, highly capable, come from a variety of backgrounds and enjoy the type of work M.C. Dean does. 

While he says it would be nice if the business stays in the family, Dean’s priority is to keep the company private for the foreseeable future.

“The very best thing about working here is the people you work with and the people you work for,” he says. “The offices change, even some of the things you do change, but culture requires a very strong foundation.”

Moonlite Drive-In Theatre
Abingdon

How do you preserve and celebrate the history of a community institution that’s been around for 75 years? Well, you can acquire it and continue the tradition as the Blevins family did in March when they bought the Moonlite Drive-In Theatre, making a longtime dream a reality.

The fun — and hard work — of restoring the drive-in to its 20th century glory days has begun. The drive-in hasn’t been fully operational since 2013, save for a COVID-era stint when it hosted live performances by the historic Barter Theatre.

“Some days I think we’re absolutely crazy,” says owner Renee Blevins, “because it’s a bigger undertaking than we realized.”

The Blevinses are the fifth owners in the fractured history of the Moonlite, which was built in 1949 by Thomas Dewey Fields. Blevins has learned a lot about Fields thanks to five trash bags full of receipts from his 16-year ownership that were stored away in the screen tower. Her dream is to reopen the drive-in by April 2025 as a place for local families to enjoy movies and fun activities. 

Work needed to get the Moonlite up and running again includes restoring its concession stand and screening tower. From there, the family has even more ambitious dreams for putting their own spin on the place — reinstalling a playground and putt-putt course, converting the concession stand to a 1950s-era diner, building a deck where they can host pre-movie concerts and other community events, and converting the ground level of the screening tower into an apartment they can rent out. But Blevins doesn’t know yet how attainable those dreams are.

The goal for her and her husband, both of whom grew up going to the drive-in, is to restore some of that togetherness in their community.

“It’s really fun, and we hope people will come out and support the activities that we do,” she says. “The biggest thing we need is community support to be successful.”

50 YEARS

Divaris Real Estate
Virginia Beach

When Divaris Real Estate celebrated its 50th anniversary this year, the company gave out Amarula chocolate bars to attendees — a nod to the company’s roots in South Africa, where cousins Gerald and Michael Divaris founded the company before moving to Virginia in 1981.

Today, the Virginia Beach-based real estate firm manages and leases 40 million-plus square feet of office, retail and industrial space throughout the U.S., represents more than 75 national retailers and employs more than 200 people. He and his company are perhaps best known for developing Virginia Beach Town Center, a bustling mixed-use project with offices, retail, hotels and restaurants.

Chairman and CEO Gerald Divaris attributes the company’s success to four pillars that are embedded in the company’s mantra and philosophy: Work very hard, do work that’s meaningful, never take “no” for an answer, and treat the people who work with you as family. “I follow those four points avidly every day.”

Going into business with family can be problematic, but it was a dynamic Divaris was familiar with because his parents and grandparents were in family retail businesses. Even as Divaris’ real estate company grew beyond his family, it maintained a family feel. 

“Immediate family is a strength because you have undivided support if it’s properly harnessed and gives you leverage from others who might only be interested in being there for the day,” Divaris says. “I treat my employees and associates as extended family.”

Crutchfield Corp.
Albemarle County

Bill Crutchfield set out to do something novel when he founded a car stereo mail-order retail business out of his mother’s basement in 1974. But when it came to choosing a name for the company, he took a more conventional route, choosing Crutchfield because he believes that companies named for their founders enjoy more longevity than those with generic names. Fifty years later, that hunch proved prescient.

Crutchfield Corp. is a rarity of sorts — the business is still going strong, and he’s been at the helm the entire time as founder and CEO. Consistency has proven to be an important strategy, as Crutchfield attributes his company’s success to frugality, out-of-the-box innovation, and a very strict organizational culture.

His proudest accomplishments during the past half century include never conducting layoffs and consistently ranking among the best employers in Virginia. Plus, the business has thrived amid uncertainty. “I’ve managed through seven recessions while maintaining profitability,” Crutchfield says.

But the early days were trying. When the company started failing in its first year and the bank where Crutchfield obtained a $25,000 line of credit told him it was the worst loan in the statewide system, he had to improvise quickly — an attribute that’s proven valuable in an ever-changing consumer electronics industry. 

Crutchfield sent a survey to customers that revealed selling car stereo systems via mail order was a fine business — if only they knew how to install the equipment. He started sending out a “magalog” — a hybrid between a catalog and magazine — that included how-to explainers on installation. “Business just exploded.”

25 YEARS

TowneBank
Virginia Beach

When Bob Aston envisioned starting a new community bank headquartered in Hampton Roads in 1998, he didn’t expect locals would rally around the idea to the tune of about $50 million. In fact, TowneBank had more working capital than it needed, so it returned about $13 million to the community before launching in 1999.

“We had no idea we were going to be overwhelmed with money coming in,” recalls Aston, the bank’s founder and executive chairman. “By the same token, these people were investing their trust in us because we had no bank at that point.”

That grassroots effort paid off, both for the bank and investors. The company has paid shareholders some $517 million in dividends and invested $115 million in the community in philanthropic support since 1999, Aston notes.

What’s more, a lot of talented people lined up to work for TowneBank — people who had worked with Aston and his partners in the past or had competed against them and were excited to be part of a new community bank. An initial team of 84 employees has since swelled to nearly 2,800, and the company focuses on hiring people who are “givers and not takers,” he says, because its culture is centered around caring and a strong sense of belonging. “We sort of view ourselves as a Main Street bank.”

Starting in 2001, TowneBank began expanding beyond core banking services and into insurance, real estate and vacation property management. Those businesses have contributed to the company’s success and stability while it weathered some chaotic periods in the industry, including the 2008-2009 financial crisis, Aston adds.

This period of discomfort proved beneficial to the company’s success. Today, it dominates 28% of the deposit market share in Hampton Roads and manages $17 billion-plus in assets. Looking ahead to the next 25 years, Aston says, it’s important to forge ahead with the same business model and culture of caring, while eyeing expansion opportunities along the Interstate 85 corridor as far south as Greenville, South Carolina.

“That’s our future over the next 25 years,” he says.